As you all know, I participated in the Winners Walk of Hope this past sunday. I'll start this post with the positives...
I did it! I raised more than my fundraising goal of $500, and I walked 6km...
IN 45 MINUTES!
I had set a goal of 5km in 48minutes as per what the monitor on the treadmill tells me at the gym, and was so happy to have squashed that time....with an additional km, and two bathroom breaks!
Now to the negative...
The event was most definitely the worst organized event that I've ever participated in. Here's the rundown of the inefficiencies...
- Registration was to begin at 9:00am, the walk at 10:00am. I showed up at about 9:20am to register, at a table with no signage, no organization and was given no information as to how the event was going to work (starting line, finish line, route markers etc.)
- Tshirts for the mini-walks were in limited supply, so if you wanted one (which I did...) you had to come early. There was no mention of tshirts at registration, and while I was walking I noticed a plethora of dogs and small children (like I'm talking under the age of 5) with adult Winners Walk of Hope tshirts on...
- By about 9:30am, I was wondering what the heck was going on and wandered over to the registration table to ask. Apparently...people were already out on the course, and were almost finished! You're supposed to register and just start walking..."Go left and then left at the balloons, and then right at the Pool..." Uhm...thanks?
- There were no balloons! There were no route markers, no defined start and finish line with a banner, no volunteers out of the course...no nothing!
- At around 9:35, I received a bbm from C saying that a cheque presentation had just occurred...$4, 000 was raised in total online. I raised about $600 of that, and certainly would have liked to have seen the cheque presentation
- While I was out on the course, I noticed teams that were walking for someone that they lost, walking with a survivor and others like me, who were just walking for the cause as a whole. My heart fell heavy when I saw the teams...knowing that they missed the cheque presentation, and that they received no recognition for their own personal reasons for being there. A moment of silence before everyone went out walking would have been nice...
- After the first loop, I met up with C and Owen, who came out for the second loop. It was a disheartening sight when I came back in...the volunteers had cleared up the registration table...and were leaving! There were still two teams out on the course, and about 20 individual walkers who'd yet to finish, and some who had just started!
Needless to say, it was incredibly poorly run. I felt horrible for those who were walking for someone they lost, or with a survivor who beat this disease.
Given how poorly it was run, I'm hesitant to do the walk next year...which really sucks considering the amazing cause that I was walking for, and I'm be shocked if I wasn't the only one who was reconsidering their involvement. And you can bet your bottom dollar that I'll be making my disappointment known...I don't want the cause to suffer in the future because of poor organization!
Owen waiting for Mommy to finish her walk
Finishing the first loop...then we went out as a family
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